Episode27
The Royal Court of the Squirrels ...sounds like the the ravings of a lunatic, but here we are. Following our catastrophic diplomatic encounter with the Felidea our intrepid simulation of a useful robot Crash intercepted communications from the fleet indicating that they have accelerated their vanguard (i.e., sent the fastest ships ahead of the larger fleet) and will arrive a week's time. While this is undoubtedly A Problem, it is probably not the most pressing issue we have to deal with. Kiwi is considering telling the great warrior Squee'Kak about the problem and allowing him to muster forces for Plan Endor. The potential advantages are a) frees up PC time for our other problems and b) gives Squee'Kak a purpose and outlet for the energy of the warriors. Of course, comments and opinions from the Peanut Gallery are always appreciated. With the timelines advancing we pondered how to accelerate contact with the Monarchy and were fortunate to find out that the Monarchy's Vizier Cruz was coming to visit. Kruze arrived with some pretty high level attendants (Hawthorne and Ripper? One of them noticed Kiwi casting a spell despite the 20+ Stealth check. Am I not Epic enough?). Cruz invited Kiwika, Grey Nut and the Chief onto the deck of his ship, which was some kind of breach in protocol or something. As the Prophecy Made Flesh, Kiwika was unconcerned and joined the Vizier for tea. Not wanting to recreate the diplomatic purgatory that was Ekenwynn (squirrel politics seem much more direct), Kiwi quickly informed the Vizier of his intentions to a) eradicate the presence and influence of the Reavers and b) relocate the Treewee and their home trees. Fortunately the Vizier's goals aligned quite closely with ours so we were able to reach an agreement as well as gain some critical information. The Squirrel King Skeet and Queen Crissa may have been corrupted but they are powerful figureheads and necessary to uniting the squirrels. One of the Black Eye twins is always with the King and Queen, while the other one is in the temple and may be too dangerous to be allowed outside (awesome). The captain of the Monarchy guard, Spik, has reportedly killed a Reaver on his own, losing only his eye to the fray. He also appears to be unaligned as far as the Black Eyes are concerned, which means he could be a potential ally. We spent a block getting ready and then travelled to the Monarchy with the Vizier where we were greeted by the King, Queen, royal guard and Claw'cowac. Sighing inwardly, Kiwi made a conciliatory statement thanking the court for the invite and we broke there. Best Quote of the night (and what I would have titled this summary): "We shall meet them in peace as a sign of our strength" - Kiwi'ka the Chosen and Saviour of the Smoke Ring Everything Else -The Vizier's Ship got the note "Endless Energy Closed Circut Magic Loop FTL Photosynthesis Drive" -The Vizier has complete faith in his attendents, but I am less sure. Might be worth an info gathering block to check em out. -Grey Nut made some comments about Sproo'Seeree still being part of the Black Eyes. Not sure is she has any actual information or is just fear mongering. Kiwi is still super suspicious but is taking Oz's advice about assassinating people without cause (or at least a contract!). -The Monarchy home tree is completely sustained by magic, like a kind of magical industrialization. It's difficult to reconcile the two sides as my heart is with the tribals but my minmax is with the Monarchy... -Kiwi did some research on other Home Trees in the galaxy and determined that it is very likely and definitely some on the Dragon planet. Which is useful information for when we clear out all those pesky Dragon Reavers. But he did learn that these Spirit Nuts are the key to growing new trees. -I wrote down these numbers but I'm not sure of their accuracy: 116 home trees, 48 tribes and 61 dead and salvageable home trees (that have been mostly gathered by the monarchy). Also, approximately 160,000 total Treewee population with about 15,000 living within the Monarchy right now. 30 trees have pledged to the Monarchy. The Black Eye population is about 1,500 total. - The Treewee Monarchy are capable of building environmental shielding and power sources for our FTL drives. This means that our party only need build FTL drives which should speed things up considerably. - We contacted Purrina via sneaky-Pete Tachyon transmission asking for everything she could find out about the fleet approaching the Smoke Ring. We expect to have an answer the following morning. - Now that all the Seers know of our presence and plan to save the Treewee its a given that the Black Eyes have communicated this to the Reavers using their dead Reaver husk. The timer has started on their response. On a related note, the Reavers have been searching for something in Kovinus space. We still don't know what that is but we may find out soon now that they know of our location. Priority List (where I try to come up with a plan for discussion that will be ignored until next week when we will just play it by ear) 1a. Expunge the Reaver Presence from the Monarchy. We sort of have an idea about getting the Black Eyed Twin alone and shanking her but we don't really know what motivates her or why she would agree to meet us alone. I suggest we be opportunistic but not Pete level agressive. No matter what we do, we're going to need to figure out how to counteract the effects of the mind control bracelets on the King and Queen and that means getting access to one. It sounds like just removing the bracelets are not enough so we will need to do some work on repairing the damage if possible. 1b. Flying Trees. This is pretty much equally important since if we can't move the home trees, this whole thing is for naught. How is this coming along? 2. Felidea. While this isn't the biggest problem, it is something we'll need to deal with. Seems to be a spread of opinions in how to address it from "Make a Deal with them" (i.e, the Vichy solution) to "Murder them at Brunch". While I tend to lean towards Plan Endor as a stalling tactic, I think it's more important that we're all onside with whatever we decide to do (i.e, not working at cross purposes). The Felidea almost certainly want to extract the tree metal and screw over the Treewee so it seems unlikely that they will let us fly our trees away with no interference (but maybe they will let us fly a couple trees away, which would let us gate out the others?). Another idea would be to let them have the Monarchy's stockpile as bait for the Reavers, but playing with fire yadda yadda yadda. 3. Flee the imminent Reaver arrival (note: this item may jump up in priority depending on when they arrive) 4. Install Home Trees at strategic locations across the galaxy. 5. All the other things I missed 22 Genaric 11 combat for the logger Bennie for Karlid . Back to Space Junk Log Category:Space Junk